The Rescue Mission
by SirMandokarla
Summary: Kaliyo is imprisoned, Cipher Nine is working alone, and Scorpio is busy committing war crimes. That leaves Eckard Lokin, Vector Hyllis, Raina Temple, and the newly recruited Darren Temple to mount a rescue mission for their resident compulsive liar. For the crew of the Sanguine End, nothing is ever simple.
1. Chapter 1

Raina Temple was having a good day.

Alright, maybe she'd just found out that the branch of the government she'd been working for for the last few months had been shut down. They'd also arrested Kaliyo, her sort-of friend. All because of a shadowy group of conspirators known as the Star Cabal, which not only wanted to destroy the Sith and Jedi, but also, very specifically, Cipher Nine himself.

Cipher Nine, who probably wasn't Cipher Nine after the dissolution of Imperial Intelligence, was currently leaving for the wasp's nest that was Corellia, one of the most strongly contested planets in the entire war and definitely under the influence of the Star Cabal. Cipher Nine was leaving, alone, to intentionally draw the attention of a secret society that had the power to topple entire nations and had a grudge against him.

It was hard to focus on that, though.

It wasn't that Raina didn't appreciate the enormity of the situation. It was just that she was being sent, with the rest of the Sanguine End's crew, to rescue Kaliyo. Without their leader.

The whole thing would be terrifying, except for a few things.

Raina's father, Darren Temple, was back. She'd found him just before the Empire would have, and she'd gotten him to safety. Now, he'd be joining them in the mission to rescue Kaliyo.

Cipher Nine was unstoppable. He was the most resourceful man Raina had ever heard of. No matter what the mission, the enemy never seemed to slow him down. He'd defeated a member of the Dark Council and won through mind control before ever meeting Raina Temple. He didn't need her for Corellia.

They had a way of tracking Kaliyo. It was hard work, but she and Vector could track her no matter where she went, and the Empire couldn't stop it.

Lastly, most importantly, was what was happening right now.

Cipher Nine, Doctor Lokin, and Darren Temple were conversing in rapid-fire spy-ese, throwing around terms Raina only knew from training documents at a pace she could barely follow. It was all advice. Ways to attract the Star Cabal's attention safely, how Kaliyo would probably react to being rescued, how to hide if things got bad enough, the names of a few contacts each had that the other might use, those sorts of things.

They wrapped up and Cipher Nine walked up to Raina. He was a small man. Raina looked down to see his sharp-featured face, partially hidden by the headgear that covered his ears, chin, and where his eyes should be. He had that smile he often had - not that he smiled often, but it almost always looked the same way - where he wasn't really looking at her, but it was clear she was the only one he was focusing on. It made her feel important. Like she was worth seeing, even without eyes.

"Raina," he said, trying his best to look her in the eye, "I'm proud of you. I didn't get the chance to say that yet, but when you went after Cipher Three alone.. You did good work. I trust you to do the same for Kaliyo. The Doctor is in charge, but… if it comes down to the moral decision, I leave it to you."

Her breath hitched and she blinked away tears, barely keeping herself from reaching up and wiping them away. Maybe he wouldn't notice if she didn't move.

If Cipher Nine did notice, he ignored her emotional break. Seemingly without any signal, Vector came over to the pair of them. Cipher Nine didn't look directly at him, but he wasn't exactlylooking at Raina anymore, either. "One last check," he said. "Then it's all up to you. The Doctor and Darren should be capable of planning around any complications, but don't forget that your abilities make you more suited for certain tasks than they may give you credit for."

"Agent," Vector said gently, "this is not Intelligence. Our skills will not be overlooked. You have nothing to fear."

The other man gave a breathless laugh and nodded. "Alright," he said. Then he reached out and grasped both of their shoulders. An intense feeling overtook Raina, like being in a room surrounded by friends.

"We have it," Vector reported.

Cipher Nine nodded and pulled his hands away. The feeling diminished. It didn't go away completely, though. Whether that was because Vector kept the connection to Kaliyo up, or because Raina actually was in a room surrounded by friends, it was hard to tell.

She smiled. Friends. It was still hard to think of the others that way. Vector was part alien, Doctor Lokin was practically a monster, and Kaliyo was… well, a cutthroat scoundrel. Then there was Scorpio, the droid. Honestly, before she brought her father to the ship, Raina had secretly thought she and Cipher Nine were the only sane people on the ship.

Raina looked around.

Cipher Nine was already gone, without a word. Vector, too, but the Joiner was in the cockpit setting a course for the ship.

A hand dropped gently onto Raina's shoulder. She looked up to see a man with greying hair and electric eyes. They were blue eyes that didn't look anything like Raina's, but she was pretty sure she got her nose from him. She wondered if she got anything from her mother. She'd been too young to pay attention to that sort of thing when she'd been smuggled out of the Empire. Maybe she should ask one day.

"Another rescue mission," Darren Temple said in an exaggeratedly gruff voice. "I hear you're good at those."

Raina smiled and took his hand. "Yes," she said, thinking back to how she'd saved him from the Empire only days ago. "I believe I am."

"... distributed into six blocks, each arranged in concentric pairs ascending the station. That means access from the center is almost the only viable option…"

Darren Temple perked up. "Almost?"

Raina sighed. With a few flicks of her hand, she rotated and zoomed in on a particular section of the holographic blueprint she was examining. With one finger, she traced a thin, almost membranous, webwork along the inside of the station's surface.

"This particular model has a ventilation system designed to be impassable. Technically, these blueprints aren't even correct - they just show a projected possible layout for the system. In each case, the entire infrastructure is left up to a seed code and an algorithm, so even a scout, like a mouse droid, couldn't find its way through."

"But?"

Raina bit her lip and skimmed around the blueprint, trying to find a good example. When she did, she tapped on a nexus of vents, then zoomed out with the nexus centered in the image. "A large enough nexus of vents can, possibly, weaken the station's armour in a given section. A well-placed shaped charge could breach it."

Her father frowned. "Not exactly stealthy."

"No," Raina admitted. "And, while I have some explosives training, Kaliyo Djannis is our expert. I also can't think of how to actually find one of these nexuses in any reasonable time frame."

Darren nodded and beckoned with one hand. "Alright. Pass it over here. You can move onto the next one and I'll tell you if I have any ideas."

Raina did as suggested and moved on to the next potential candidate, a prison satellite embedded in an asteroid. She hoped to the Emperor that this wouldn't be the kind they found. The modular design meant it would be hard to predict the layout except by Imperial regulations, and then there was the matter of even reaching a particular asteroid in an entire field of them.

Asteroid fields. She didn't even want to think of the odds of surviving one.

She inspected the blueprint closely, then ran a calculation of the Sanguine End's trajectory, searching for any asteroid fields in the projected path.

Nothing within Imperial territory. On to the next option.

"Raina."

Raina glanced over at her father, then realized he was putting down his datapad, and actually turned to face him. "Yes, father?"

"I have a concern that we haven't had the chance to discuss, with how busy the past two days have been."

She nodded for her father to continue.

"How much do you trust this crew?"

"Oh." Raina blinked, unable to come up with an immediate response. It seemed a simple question.

It wasn't that she distrusted them, exactly. She'd always felt fairly safe on the ship, even as she'd started figuring out how much was under the surface there.

Vector sometimes seemed barely human, with his black eyes and unnatural movement. Even worse were the little killik fingerlings that infested the ship and talked to him. In their skin and their clothes and the walls.

Kaliyo was a liar and probably unstable. She liked hurting people more than Raina wanted to think about and she'd betrayed more people than Raina had ever befriended.

Doctor Lokin was a monster, a rakghoul in a man's clothing. He watched them all with a predator's eyes. He probably had the whole ship bugged, too.

Bugs which, being mechanical, Scorpio probably used for eyes. The whole crew knew that the only thing keeping that droid from killing them all was Cipher Nine's programming and its fascination with their methods.

Then there was Cipher Nine himself…

"I trust Cipher Nine," she managed with a weak smile. "He's the one who saw the programming I had and helped get rid of it."

"This would be the same man who immediately asked you to betray the Empire and join him in destroying the two superpowers in the galaxy?" Darren glared into the hologram, now showing a facility with enhanced interrogation and scientific capabilities.

"That's not fair," Raina snapped. She took a deep breath and calmed herself. "Have you heard of Eradication Day?"

Darren nodded. "I haven't been completely isolated. Random destruction across the whole Empire tends to get people talking."

"That was Cipher Nine."

Her father widened. "He did that? But how- what kind of- THOSE are the methods he uses?"

"NO." Raina leaned forward in her chair, staring her father down. "I wasn't very precise. Eradication Day was part of his mission to track down a terrorist organization. The Empire ordered him to allow the destruction and rewarded him for completing his mission afterwards. He managed to stop the organization and take its leader prisoner, but he never forgave himself for what happened. The fact that the Empire did is something he can't forgive them for."

Darren scowled, but seemed to calm down. At least, his expression went quiet again and he looked like he was thinking deeply.

The thing was, it wasn't hard to understand what Cipher Nine was doing. There was just a lot to explain.

So, Raina did. She explained about Cipher Nine's time as an Imperial agent, how he'd been treated by the Sith, and how he'd eventually been sent as a double agent into the Republic SIS. She told him about the SIS's plans to wipe out entire planets with the Shadow Arsenal, about Cipher Nine's brainwashing, and about the Star Cabal. Eventually, she reached the present, with Imperial Intelligence shut down, Kaliyo Djannis in custody, Moff Phennir locked up by an ancient droid from Belsavis, and Cipher Nine off to fight a galaxy-spanning secret society on his own.

When she was done, Darren sat back in his chair with an explosive exhalation.

"Wow," he managed after a while. "And I thought my career was eventful." Then he frowned and looked sidelong at Raina. "You really trust this man? After all he's done?"

Raina nodded.

"And the others?"

This time, she hesitated.

"Ensign Temple," called a soft voice, interrupting her thoughts.

Raina spun around to see Vector standing at the entrance to the briefing room. Taking a second to catch her breath, she asked, "yes, Vector?"

"We believe we are approaching our destination. We would like to make another attempt at locating Ms. Djannis."

"Alright." Raina rose and took Vector's hands. With all her strength, she concentrated on Kaliyo, on the moments when the rattataki had been kinder than usual, stuck up for her or even come to her rescue in a fight. Those few moments they'd traded glances that weren't filled with wariness or contempt.

The feeling of connection slowly welled up in her, filling her heart and pouring out to Vector.

The Joiner's head turned, tracking the feeling, then he released Raina's hands. "Yes," he said, "that should be sufficient. We will arrive shortly. Would you like to accompany us? It may help."

"Er… alright." She followed Vector out of the room and to the cockpit, then took up a position beside him as he sat down to pilot the ship.

And waited.

And waited.

"Er, Vector," she asked eventually, "how much longer do you think we'll be?"

"It shan't be long now."

"Do we know which facility we're heading towards?"

Vector considered, then pointed at the seat beside him. "The navigation console may have the information. We are uncertain how meticulous T- Cipher Nine's records are."

"You mean Scorpio's records," Raina said with a smile. She went and sat down, bringing up the galaxy map to extrapolate their destination.

With a nod, Vector admitted, "we suppose we do."

The map resolved itself almost instantly, and Raina quickly added in their coordinates and cut the predictions down to any distance within the next two hours of travel.

There it was. Detention Facility #295, on the moon of Kraan. Low on atmosphere and gravity, with a facility designed to use the tide of the planet's gravity as a power source. In the event of a breakout, artificial gravity could be increased by up to ten times standard, at which point automated turrets would take over dealing with the prisoners.

She'd shared this with her father hours ago.

"Vector," she said, "I think I know where we're going. Can you bring us out of hyperspace a few light-years short of Kraan? We can do another check, then triangulate. If I'm right, we can work on a plan to free Kaliyo without risking exposure."

Vector agreed, and within minutes the Sanguine End had come to a stop. A quick check confirmed they'd been heading in the right direction, and another jump and check confirmed their destination.

Now, it was time to bring the problem to their most experienced spymasters.

They called Doctor Lokin out of his lab and threw up blueprints over the briefing table. 2V brought in refreshments, and everybody sat down to examine the hologram.

It was actually a lot easier to deal with the basics when Cipher Nine wasn't around. Describing the structure of an entire facility for somebody who couldn't see holograms was time-consuming. When they got to the planning, however…

"We can't do that," snapped Darren Temple. "There's no backup plan. If anything goes wrong, you'll be sucking vacuum."

Doctor Lokin returned Darren's criticism with a mild glare. "Colourful metaphors aside, a subtle approach is necessary in this case, and more likely to succeed in reacquiring Kaliyo."

"Also more likely to get you, and all of us, killed." Raina's father practically growled the words, and she could see, or maybe feel, the fear hidden there. Maybe it was for himself, or maybe it was for his daughter, but he didn't like the idea of Doctor Lokin's one-man rescue effort at all. Raina was inclined to agree.

"If we may," Vector said, coughing quietly into his fist, "we are concerned that your plans fail to account for Ms. Djannis' responses. She is quite a disruptive influence, after all."

"Which just proves my point," her father added, tracing a line from the prison entrance to the cell block on the blueprint holo, "if anything unexpected occurs on your way in, a reliable cover story is more use than stealth generators, which have been known to fail under increased gravity."

The argument went back and forth like that for a while, with Raina watching, studying the blueprint and trying not to pay attention to the rising volume in the room.

It made sense that planning things was difficult. Cipher Nine was always the linchpin of their missions, with one or two of the crew acting as his support and backup either nearby or in the Sanguine End. It was easy to imagine him doing the same with the prison, disappearing for a few hours and then turning up, already back inside the ship with Kaliyo beside him.

It wouldn't be helpful to mention that. In truth, Raina doubted she could help much at all. There were protocols in the Imperial Intelligence service. She knew them and could follow them, but she'd been relying on Cipher Nine to show her how to adapt over the last few months. As it was, even Vector's experience far surpassed hers. What would could she even say? Take that route to avoid most of the cameras and any possible turrets? Doctor Lokin knew that; he was an expert at finding those sorts of weaknesses. From this spot, killik fingerlings could infest the walls and, maybe, short-circuit the artificial gravity in the base? Not only would Vector know that, but it would give away everything. Raina herself could easily act as a distraction, but in the event that the guards could resist her, Darren had brought aboard gaseous sedatives from his time on the run? Her father had already mentioned that as part of one of his backup plans.

In short, Raina had nothing to add to the conversation. It had all been said or was all well-known, because the others were experts at being spies.

But, as the volume in the room rose to a crescendo, Raina had a realization: everything had been said. It was just that most of it hadn't been heard. So she took a deep breath, concentrated, and, with all her willpower, said, "I have some suggestions."

The room went silent, and Raina Temple smiled as the three men looked to her.

Calm breaths, thought Raina. Remember your training. Confidence is the easiest way to prevent questions, and the easiest way to lie is to let the target assume a story.

Raina walked, confidently, down the ramp of the Sanguine End, with her father manacled in front of her and Vector leading the way. Somewhere, ahead of them, behind them, or somewhere else entirely, was Doctor Lokin, so silent and invisible that it felt like even Cipher Nine wouldn't know he was there.

Four men in trooper armour waited for them at the hangar exit, but there only response was for two of them to split off and guide Raina and Vector as they passed with their prisoner.

Easy breaths. The cover would hold. SCORPIO and Doctor Lokin had set it up personally.

As long as nobody recognized her.

No chance of them recognizing Vector, at least.

The walls were closer than she'd expected, like her mind had edited the blueprints to match how buildings usually felt. Here, though, the usual two and a half meter width was reduced to just a meter and a half of grey, unforgiving metal with a rounded ceiling. It made sense. The facility had to survive the increased gravity. Still, it was oppressive in a way she'd never experienced before.

One hallway's walk from the hangar, an officer stood at the entrance to the processing room. He was tall, straight-backed, with a nervous air, and the room looked like it had been recently cleaned. That made sense. Doctor Lokin had given Vector a rank of colonel.

There was nothing better for intimidating an Imperial soldier than rank.

The officer saluted as crisply as he could, and Darren Temple was handed over. Vector returned the officer's salute, and it was surprising how intimidating he looked, how his eyes could glint that hard steel-grey that felt just like an officer watching for any mistakes.

Everything was going perfectly. Raina's father would carry a supply of fingerlings down to Kaliyo for their escape, Doctor Lokin would subtly sabotage the turrets, and Vector would wait for the perfect moment to insinuate an inspection so he could sabotage the gravity. With Raina there to push anybody who wasn't helpful enough and the connection they had with Kaliyo, it should be easy to force an evacuation.

Simple is the closest thing to failsafe, Raina thought as she watched another guard wave her father past.

Then the alarms went off.


	2. Chapter 2

Raina froze. She couldn't help it. All her training, and when she came up against the collapse of her deception, it was like all her possible responses piled into a dam in her mind. Vector, beside her, seemed to have a similar conflict. He could lie right now, probably, and even when his eyes were black he still had a surprising skill for letting others make assumptions for him. Still, if they were questioned…

Raina's hand moved to her blaster.

A guard stepped out of the administration room and yelled over the alarms, "get in, quick! Gravity's about to kick in!"

The men around them ran for the door and Vector and Raina followed. Raina's father, left standing down the hall at the scanners, yelled something indignant at being left.

The moment Raina entered the administration room, withi its one wall of transparisteel and three others covered in computer terminals and monitors, one of the guards slammed the door behind her.

Outside, Darren Temple buckled to hands and knees, then slowly lay flat as gravity overpowered him.

The same must be happening all over the facility, to every prisoner and guard not in a designated safe room, the med bay, or the same room as the grav generator.

Doctor Lokin, wherever he was, would not be near one of those.

"Third time," one of the guards spat. "The frakking third time that white-skinned beast has triggered a lockdown. I say we let the turrets do their job and say she left us no choice."

Raina and Vector shared a look. Raina's was a bit more frustrated, while Vector's was more exasperated, but they both said the same thing: "Kaliyo."

The guard officer misinterpreted their looks and snapped at the man who'd spoken, "that woman is a prisoner of the Empire. We've been given instruction to hold her until she is properly interrogated, and we will not shirk our duty!"

On the monitors, guards in safe rooms busily dressed in full anti-grav powered armour suits. Some, who hadn't made it into those rooms, lay in the halls. As for the prisoners, every one lay on a bunk in his, her, or its cell. Except for two: Raina's father, and a spitting angry Kaliyo Djannis.

Somehow, it warmed Raina's heart to imagine the language Kaliyo must be hurling at her captors. For a lying, untrustworthy cutthroat, she had her moments.

Vector murmured, "three escapes?"

A quaver entered the officer's voice as he tried to defend himself. "All unsuccessful, of course. We-"

"How unsuccessful?" Raina interrupted in a tone she'd heard often in the Chiss Ascendancy. She pointed at the monitor that showed Kaliyo in a hallway that was empty except for two guards lying near her, quietly bleeding. She was still stubbornly crawling forward, a couple centimeters at a time. "Where is her cell? When was her first escape? How long does it take your guards to collect the prisoners? Why, after two previous escapes, are there still guards caught outside of their safe rooms?"

The coldness in her voice at the end reminded her of Hoth in a few ways, not least how the guard officer clearly suppressed a shiver in response.

"Ah..." The man looked to Vector as if asking for help, but Vector's inhumanly blank gaze was focused elsewhere, on one of the monitors. Raina followed his eyes, and fear mixed with revulsion at the scene within.

A body, white-coated and grey-haired, writhed and rippled on the floor of an area labeled 34B. A part of Raina's brain reported that this was close to the facility's main power generator, and another part took control of her mouth.

A sudden, sharp wave of her hand dragged the gaze of everyone in the room back to her. She raised her voice slightly and asked, "how did the prisoner escape each time? Have the batteries in the suits been recharged? Have those staff caught in each lockdown received medical check-ups? What of the prisoners? Have engineers maintained the grav generator after each lockdown?"

Now, every eye in the place was glued to her. Mostly in fear. Suddenly, everyone was more worried for their careers, dead-end as they were, than about the prisoners.

Fortunately, the officer was one of those people who started talking when he was afraid. He began to babble excuses and answers as best he could, desperately trying to avoid blame for how much he'd missed, yet without anyone to pass the buck onto.

It was a fruitful, if unorthodox, interrogation. Cipher Nine would have been proud. She learned that there hadn't been time to charge the anti-grav suits between Kaliyo's escape attempts, which meant they probably wouldn't last through another lockdown. The turrets hadn't been activated because several prisoners were too valuable even to risk stun bolts on. The grav generator had not seen additional maintenance. Nearly half of the guard staff had been injured in some way, and therefore those currently working were overworked and largely without spare medical equipment. Because of this, extra medical check-ups weren't possible.

Vector took the initiative and began giving out orders. His emotionless features and calm voice commanded the room in a way Raina had to work for. He ordered an emergency shut-down of the grav generator the moment Kaliyo was back in her cell, and for all spare power to be siphoned towards recharging the suits as quickly as was safe. Turrets and blaster pistols were to be set to stun so that a reduced guard complement could safely imprison the population. All injured guards, as well as those caught in lockdowns, would be shipped off-moon to receive proper medical treatment. Half the remaining guards would be given leave to rest, and the prisoners would begin a round of check-ups. Vector would personally observe the reprogramming of the turrets while Raina dealt with a re-organization of the prisoners in preparation for the changes.

And with that, everything fell into place. They'd get Kaliyo and Darren where they wanted them, quarter the number of guards in one fell swoop, and render the lockdown system all but useless.

Raina almost felt like dancing a jig.

Almost. There was stil the matter of Doctor Lokin, who'd shifted to rakghoul on the very premises.

With luck, they'd all survive that decision.

The lockdown lasted an interminably long time. At least it was possible to prep the injured for evacuation while the gravity was on, since the med bay was shielded from its effects. When it finally ended, the guard officer – Officer Burlin, apparently – sent out his orders and caused the mass evacuation of the facility.

Raina nodded once, sharply, then led Officer Burlin and three guards out of the room without a word. Vector would take the rest to the security controls and supervise the reprogramming of the turrets. It wasn't quite as effective as shutting down the facility's power, but with a few killik fingerlings, it could be nearly as effective and much more subtle.

The walk to the prisoner's quarter wasn't long, but it was oppressive. The walls were still far too close, and with the silence of the guards, Raina noticed an eerie scratching sound through the walls. She forced herself to ignore it as her mind raced to figure out all the variables left in their plan. Raina was good at pointing out flaws in schematics and protocol, but now that they were out of a room where she could browbeat an unsuspecting officer, would she be able to keep up the charade? What about Doctor Lokin? He was missing, leaving them without any backup and a teammate unaccounted for. Vector had been… how long? Almost three hours now without his connection to the nest. He'd warned that the experience was uncomfortable for him. How much longer could he last? They'd expected to be in and out already. How long could this go on?

Raina could have led the way to the prison blocks from the blueprints she'd studied, but she wasn't so prepared for the cell block itself.

It was loud.; Prisoners filled cells as far as the eye could see, and all of them were yelling, some at the guards, some at each other, and most just yelling in general about Kaliyo. Her escape attempts were making her pretty unpopular among the prisoners, who had to spend hours held to the floor every time a lockdown occurred.

This was the prison that was quickly evacuating most of its guard personnel Vector and Raina might have misjudged the situation.

It didn't matter. There was one mission objective. Cipher Nine wouldn't be stopped by a few complications, so they couldn't be, either.

"Where is the escapee, Officer Burlin?"

Burlin paled slightly, likely imagining his visiting officer being attacked by one of his prisoners. "Kaliyo Djannis has been placed in solitary confinement. For our protection."

"Bring her out."

This time, the officer went completely white. "M-ma'am, Kaliyo Djannis is a dangerous alien. She-"

Raina sent him a glare she'd learned from Kaliyo herself, one that said the guard officer knew his place beneath her, but didn't understand how far beneath her that was. "I am more than capable of defending myself should your facility prove inadequate yet again. Be grateful Hyllus and I care enough for the Empire to ensure this facility runs smoothly before our departure. It may be the only thing that saves you from execution for incompetence."

She had to suppress a wince as Burlin quailed and hurried to do her bidding at the same time. Between bureaucracy and the terror of the Sith, threats like hers were effective, but too cruel to be easy.

The three guardes and Burlin moved quickly to the end of the cell blocks, ignoring the cells close on both sides with the contempt of experience. The one prisoner who tried to grab for Raina stared down her blaster for a second of stunned surprise, then retreated to his cot.

Maybe she was imagining it, but Raina thought she might hear the scratching again as they left behind the main prisoner area, even with the noise that still carried down the halls.

The isolation cell itself was plain and somehow even smaller and more cramped than the other cells looked. The three guards, and two others who'd been standing at the door, all pointed their blasters at it. Burlin also had his hand on his blaster pistol, though he hadn't drawn it. None of them moved to open the door. Honestly, she didn't blame them.

Raina strode to the door, then picked the smallest guard and handed him her blaster. She turned to Officer Burlin, who'd realized what she was doing and was picking his jaw up off the floor.

"If the prisoner somehow overpowers me," Raina spoke in that casually confident way Cipher Nine used, "you will shoot both her and myself, and Hyllus will sign my order of execution for incompetence posthumously. Now, open the door."

One of the guards did so, obediently, and Raina walked in to see her crewmember.

A shape flashed in the dim room and, predictably, Kaliyo leapt at her intruder.

"Stop!"

The power of the Force – what little Raina had to bear – slammed into Kaliyo. For somebody like her, it barely caused hesitation, but the familiar feeling was enough to make her stop.

Kaliyo squinted in the hallway's light and almost spoke before Raina cut her off.

"Kaliyo Djannis. My name is Warrant Officer Raina Mawsk. I've been made aware of the problems you've caused since arriving at this facility, and I intend to ensure they will not continue after my departure. Come with me."

Raina looked back, once, when she reached the door, and saw Kaliyo holding back a confused laugh, but the rattataki schooled her features and made to follow.

Internally, Raina was screaming at herself that none of this could work, that they'd all be caught and killed any moment, but Burlin seemed too shocked to question her.

Raina led them all the way to the end of the cell block, to the last cell before the facility's guard quarters, med bay, armoury, and other assorted necessities. When she reached the last cell, she turned to it and said, "get these prisoners out of here. And find Cipher Three, the prisoner we just brought in. He will be Ms. Djannis' new cellmate."

Officer Burlin looked ready to protest, but Raina fixed him with a glare and said, "Cipher Three is the only prisoner of this facility unlikely to hold a grudge against Djannis. We need all the space we can get. Bring him. Then start moving those prisoners furthest from her into these cells. I want only those cells closest to the guard quarters populated, four to a cell. Once that is done, enact the guard shift changes and begin medical procedures on the prisoners. Maybe then this place will finally be respectable again."

They hesitated. Probably too much information at once.

What would and Imperial officer do?

"Now!" Raina barked, "or I will have you thrown before Moff Phennir!"

They moved. Quickly.

In spite of ample motivation, it took hours to move half the prison population. Vector joined them after deactivating the facility's grav generator, though he was beginning to look haggard and distracted. Just as worrying was the continued absence of Doctor Lokin. Other problems cropped up, too. The prisoners in transit had three close fights that had to be dealt with, guards who were supposed to be on duty were disappearing as the evacuations continued, and it turned out one of the safe rooms had malfunctioned, damaging the anti-grav suits and injuring the guards inside.

Raina had asked about the scratching, if perhaps the facility had vermin. Of course the guards she'd asked had denied it, but their tone seemed sincere.

Not that any of these were really problems for the Sanguine End's crew, but somehow Raina still got a sense of foreboding. Something was wrong, or about to go wrong, and she had no clue what. It was disconcerting, because everything seemed to be going well. As soon as Doctor Lokin got in touch, they'd take Kaliyo for interrogation and Raina's father for a medical check-up, and divert to the ship and be gone before anybody could do anything.

Vector returned after a moment alone to reconnect with the hive looking no better than when he'd left.

"Hyllus," Raina whispered, glancing from him to an impatient Kaliyo, "can you last much longer?"

Vector took seconds to respond, and his only answer was, "I serve as needed."

That didn't sound like a yes to Raina, but Vector continued before she could say anything. "There is something wrong. When I… reconvened, I felt… guards are disappearing."

"Yes," Raina whispered patiently, making up her mind for them to leave with or without the doctor. "Some deserters are leaving with the evacuees."

Vector shook his head, but didn't reply.

Raina stood and approached the guards in Kaliyo's cell. "You and you," she said, pointing. "Open the cell. My partner and I will be leaving soon, and we intend to have our chance at interrogating the prisoner before then." She pointed at the last guard. "You, take the other convict to the med bay. He might as well be checked out while Djannis is out of her cell."

The guards didn't even question her. By now, they were accustomed to her bidding. Honestly, Raina didn't much like the feeling, but the grin Kaliyo shot her said the mercenary was enjoying it.

The moment they got away from the noise of the cell block, Riana heard the scratching, scraping sound again. It seemed to come more often now, but always seemed just at the edge of her hearing. Well, she wouldn't have to worry about it much longer. The room Raina had selected was past the guard quarters, almost to the administration room. From there, it wouldn't be far to get out of the facility.

Entering the interrogation room was a surreal experience. There was a part of Raina that had always feared being on Kaliyo's side of this, in a small room with two Imperial officers leaning over a desk with manacles attached to it, and guards standing just outside the door.

Fortunately for Kaliyo, it wasn't an official interrogation room – that was past the cell blocks and one floor down – so the manacles were just handcuffs and the desk wasn't even bolted to the floor.

Even more fortunately, the two Imperial officers were more than accommodating. As soon as the doors closed, they undid the handcuffs and sat down across from Kaliyo.

Kaliyo took one look at Vector and said, "you look like poodoo, Vector. And what's up with your eyes?"

Vector gave a tired grimace. "Related factors, I'm afraid. Some ability to dissemble was necessary for our plan. I accommodated as best I could."

That earned a raised eyebrow from Kaliyo. "I? Yeah, you're somehow less freaky with the black eyes. What's the plan for getting out of here so I don't have to look at you anymore? And where's the boss? Seems like this is his job."

Raina retrieved an earpiece, stealth generator, and blaster from Vector's bag, since he didn't seem in much condition to get them readily. "We're going to sneak you out of here. My father will join us on the way from the med bay, and we should be gone before they figure out the lockdown isn't working. Cipher Nine… is serving to distract the Star Cabal from our situation."

Kaliyo growled and slammed a hand against the table. "That hutt! He said he'd be here!"

"He is doing what he can," Vector said. There was a little heat in his weary voice. "He bears more risk than we, making a target of himself for our true enemies."

"And I guess he couldn't spare the old man," Kaliyo grumbled.

"Ah," Raina wondered how to explain to Kaliyo Djannis, Cipher Nine's most rabid protector, that their leader was alone against an enemy who'd out-maneuvered them at every turn. "Doctor Lokin-"

A yell from outside the room caught her attention and she stopped, half-worried and half-relieved. She gestured vaguely for Kaliyo to look imprisoned, then went to open the door.

"Rakghoul!" came the yell, quickly growing louder. "Rakghoul! In the prisoner's area!"

Doctor Lokin had been found. Blast. It wasn't like him to be caught somewhere so obvious.

Raina drew her blaster, dragged Vector out of the room, and signaled for a guard to follow her. He did so, reluctantly.

A woman came around the corner, red-faced but still gasping, "rakghou..."

Raina scoffed. "Rakghoul? Here? You can't expect me to believe that."

"It's true," the woman gasped, raising a hand and pointing past them, away from the cell block. "We have to acti-"

"Capture it," Raina commanded. Her mind raced, trying to figure out how to get the doctor out of this situation. "No killing. Follow me."

She strode past the guardswoman before she could say another word, Vector and a guard straggling behind her, struggling in the moon's natural low gravity. In her earpiece, she heard Kaliyo asking, "rakghoul? Are you serious? Is this the old monster's idea of a distraction?"

Raina didn't reply. She couldn't think about anything except trying to figure out some way to explain the rakghoul in the station that wasn't the truth, that Raina's ship had brought it.

"Hurry," she barked. They couldn't afford to let Doctor Lokin die. He was a monster, but he was a good man. He'd helped her and Cipher Nine and Vector time and time again. He deserved to live through this.

She doubled her pace.

What she expected to find at the cell block was a dozen terrified guards surrounding one angry rakghoul. That was not what she found, not by a long shot.

The first thing she heard was screaming, and a lot of it. It must be the prisoners, and it probably meant that Lokin was not obligingly under control, and even more likely to get shot. That was bad.

The second thing she heard was the growling, scratching, roaring sound of… no. No, it couldn't be. It must be a trick of the hallway acoustics.

Raina turned the last corner and stopped with the speed of somebody witnessing the inevitable.

There were not a dozen guards surrounding a single rakghoul. There were a dozen rakghouls mauling the last surviving guard. There were more of the grey, disgusting beasts along the hall, too, and probably down the corridors across the cell block.

How had they done this? The halls were perfect shooting lanes. And Lokin. Where was Doctor Lokin?

A rakghoul took a running leap at one of the cells. The prisoners inside screamed as the bars bent and buckled.

Had Raina bothered to contemplate the implications of that, she might have hesitated. Instead, both she and the guard raised their blasters and opened fire. The corridor lit up with blasterfire and the rakghouls' skin flashed and sparked like a festival sky.

To little effect. The rakghouls turned to face them and charged. Raina put another three bolts into the leading one before she realized it wasn't working. Then she grabbed the guard and ran, pushing Vector ahead of them. Whether the low gravity slowed down them or the rakghouls more was impossible to say, because she wasn't wasting time looking back.

A safe room. They needed a safe room. Where did the schematics say-

"This way!" Raina yelled, turning a corner so fast she glanced off the corridor wall. This time, she had to grab Vector and drag him with her, and suddenly he was lagging behind and she caught a glimpse of the rakghouls catching up.

The safe room was meters away. They could make it. They had to.

No. The door was closed! Of course it was, it was a security necessity. But now, of all times! In the time it took her to reach the door and pull it open, she heard Vector roar in pain.

He's vaccinated, she thought. He'll be okay.

The guard with them nearly bowled her over getting into the safe room, but Raina had to see what had happened.

Vector, eyes pitch black, turned from a pair of rakghouls struggling to get up off the ground. They were tangled up, without much leverage in the low gravity, but they certainly weren't hurt. No matter. Vector had his extra seconds. It took only one for him to get through the door and for Raina and the guard to pull it closed behind him.

There wasn't time to catch her breath. Raina keyed her commlink to Kaliyo and her father. "We've got a problem. There are rakghouls loose in the facility. They're immune to blasterfire. Vec-"

"You're infected," said a voice. The guard.

"No," Raina started, turning to see the man holding a gun on Vector. To his credit, he looked regretful, but determined.

"Wait!" Raina held up her hands. Her eyes darted to the blood seeping from Vector's leg. He had been hit, and he wasn't healing as fast as usual. His eyes were grey again, and distant. "We've been vaccinated. He just needs kolto and bandages."

It was true, to a point. Doctor Lokin had vaccinated the whole crew against his particular strain of the virus, but he'd only guaranteed immunity for three generations. The virus adapted too fast for more. If the rakghouls outside hadn't been infected by the doctor or somebody he'd infected, who knew what might happen?

The guard looked at her, then went back to watching Vector, suspicious. "Why would you be vaccinated? I hear most vaccines don't even work, so-"

"Listen, uh..."

"Brys."

Raina tried to focus past Kaliyo's voice in her ear.

"Brys. Our work takes us all across the galaxy. Our doctor likes to be prepared. It was a while ago, but everyone on our ship has gotten more thorough medical preparation than you can imagine. Hyllus has a good chance of getting through this, if we just patch up his leg."

The guard frowned uncertainly and gestured at Vector with his blaster pistol. "And you? What've you got to say for yourself?"

More of Kaliyo's chatter from the commlink, and something from Darren as well. Raina tuned it out. Right now, she was trying to help save Vector's life.

What Vector said wasn't exactly helpful, though. "What she says is true." In his defense, he was tired, bleeding, and disconnected from his nest for more than half a day. That didn't make his tone any less likely to get him killed.

Brys stared at Vector skeptically.

Then a new voice came on Raina's comm, the imperious and synthetic voice of Scorpio. "There is new information concerning Cipher Nine's mission against the Star Cabal-"

"Hey," Kaliyo's voice interrupted, "a little help here!?"

Unperturbed, Scorpio continued, "Cipher Nine is dead."

For an instant, Raina's brain got caught trying to process that idea. In that instant, Vector's eyes blackened and he surged forward with a cry of, "no!"

Brys screamed and pulled the trigger.

Raina moved as fast as she could, but her mind had shifted gears too many times in the last few minutes. She was nowhere near fast enough. By the time she her hand closed on the blaster pistol, the bolt had already hit Vector in the chest.

He fell backwards while Raina struggled to take the weapon from Brys. She almost had it when it went off again.


	3. Chapter 3

Brys fell to the floor, twitching. The twitching grew stronger, until the guard was flailing wildly, smashing his limbs against the floor hard enough to break bones. In seconds, the man was dead.

Raina stared down at the man, dumbstruck. She'd never seen a man die like that.

But she'd read about it. A malfunctioning blaster, set just below kill settings, could cause a chain reaction-

It took an effort to pull her mind from the safe, clean textbooks and back to the dark, cramped safe room.

Vector!

Raina dropped to her knees, hoping she was right. She opened the Joiner's eyes and was greeted by blackness. She winced, realizing there wasn't going to be an easy way to check for nervous system damage, but at least Vector was alive. Whatever chemicals the Killiks pumped through him wouldn't flow if he were dead. It was an effort of will to clear his eyes, but death would have done the job just fine.

So the files said, at least.

Kolto. He needed kolto. She took the syringe from her med pack and gave Vector a shot in the shoulder, but it wasn't much. For something like nervous system damage, she needed more.

It was almost casual, how she stepped over Brys' body to take inventory.

The room was a mess. The gravity was still low, the terminals had caved in and the monitors were cracked. A closet on the wall had a door hanging off its hinges, and the grav suits were torn and a little warped in places. A row of hooks had broken, dropping a dozen stun batons on the ground. Most of them had snapped clean in two. The medical cabinet was a wreck; there was no way the kolto dispensary would work without a computer to control it.

This was the broken safe room. That was why the guardswoman hadn't stopped here and activated the lockdown. Everything in here was broken.

Everything in here was useless.

The pounding on the door seemed to grow louder.

She needed a way to kill the rakghouls and get the team out of the base. Or at least make it out of the base. Once they escaped with any survivors, they could call in extermination crews with proper weaponry and armour. In the worst case, they could make do with the Sanguine End's weapons and turn the entire prison to ash.

When had Kaliyo gone silent?

"Kaliyo?"

Silence.

"Kaliyo, are you there?"

The comm crackled, then Darren Temple's voice spoke. "Med bay doors aren't reinforced, but we're barricading them as best we can. Any chance of reinforcements?"

"Father!" Raina didn't know whether to be relieved or more worried than ever. "Vector and I are in a safe room between the med bay and prison block. It's nonfunctional, and there are rakghouls at the doors. Vector is injured; he's unconscious. I don't know what to do; the rakghouls seem to be immune to blaster fire."

"Immune to-? Raina, the gravity isn't working in there, right? Have you adjusted the blaster settings to compensate?"

Adjusted the blaster settings?

That was right! The bolts wouldn't form properly in different gravity!

Only one other problem…

"Father," Raina said, "standard issue blasters don't allow for that level of adjustment."

There was moment of quiet on the comm. Raina thought she might have heard a muttered, "survive," and, "proper weapon," but the rakghouls' attacks on the door were too loud for her to be sure.

After a few seconds, Raina asked, "father?"

There was the sound of Darren Temple clearing his throat, then, "the lockdown hasn't activated. I suppose that means Fixer Fifteen disabled the security system before dropping us into the Tarisian underworld. Though… Raina, how many turrets are there around each safe room? Do you know where they are?"

Her father's tone matched Cipher Nine's so closely, she responded without thinking to defend Doctor Lokin. "Three. One on the ceiling and two on the floor, all just outside the door. The med bay and administration rooms have five each, and the pr-"

"You need to get to the wires between the terminal and the turrets," Darren Temple interrupted. "Can you do that?"

Raina's mind blanked. This was beyond the scope of what she'd studied.

"I have come to a decision," said Scorpio.

Raina blinked. She'd forgotten Scorpio was on the comm.

"Raina Temple, Vector Hyllus, and Kaliyo Djannis have the potential to be viable subjects. I will help preserve your lives."

Kaliyo or Cipher Nine would have said something at Scorpio's tone, but Kaliyo was still worryingly radio-silent, and the agent…

Raina took a breath, looked to Vector for strength, and asked, "what can you do, Scorpio?"

"Very little," Scorpio admitted. "Cipher Nine had possession of the only access spike he allowed me to create. Facility Kraan-295 is a closed system. However, I do have a greater understanding of the facility's schematics than an or-"

"Today, please," Darren Temple interrupted.

Raina flinched. That wasn't the way to speak to Scorpio. If she decided she didn't like someone, it usually went badly.

After a moment of silent fuming, though, Scorpio said, "the majority of the wiring is accessible via modular floor tiling. Approach the computer terminals. The area directly in front of the terminal is a focal point for the power and data transfer cables in the room."

That was all well and good, but it didn't help actually accessing the cables. Raina looked around for something to pry up the panels with, and found something hopeful. One of the spare stun batons would do. Maybe. There were several that had been slightly crushed by their fall, a few with no visible damage, and two that and been bent nearly in half.

Every second spent searching was punctuated by scratching, howling, and slamming at the door. If she didn't move fast enough, she and Vector wouldn't have to worry about anything as trivial as wiring.

As quickly as she could, Raina took one of the stun batons and bent it over a desk. In the reduced gravity, it was hard to get the leverage to twist and snap it, but she braced herself against the wall and put her weight into it. It gave with a sudden SNAP, and she caught herself on the floor, makeshift lever in hand.

The terminal was less than two meters away, so she crawled over, then wedged the broken baton in between two of the floor tiles. It popped out just as it was designed to.

Revealing another, obvious, problem.

"Which cable?" There were six under this tile alone, and she could see others underneath the panels beside it.

"The cables you need will begin as a bundle of three, each a half-centimeter in diameter." Raina tore up more panels as Scorpio spoke. "Each cable will then diverge to its turret. To activate them without an active computer, you will need to rely on their internal programming, which is rudimentary even by..."

Raina decided it would be best to tune Scorpio out for a few minutes. She knew what to do. She just needed to make sure she did it properly.

There were metal supports and pipes in between dozens of wires. Many of the wires were obviously useless, too small to carry data and power, too numerous to be for the turrets, or obviously heading off in the wrong direction, but even with Scorpio's advice, the number of candidates only narrowed down to three. Technically, she could probably narrow it down more, but that would require a way to perfectly measure the cables. None were handy.

It wasn't that any of the three were likely to start up anything dangerous, but the time it would take to splice each directly to the power line…

The door rattled and Vector gave a quiet, pained groan. Scorpio had lapsed into silence, and now the comm was silent. No sign of Kaliyo. Still, Raina didn't rush. Rushing was carelessness. Carelessness got one killed.

Though she couldn't help the personal voice of Kaliyo in her mind screaming that rakghouls "got one killed", too.

Hopefully the real Kaliyo was just hiding, silent because making noise in this prison was a death sentence now.

Alright. Time to splice a live wire in a combat situation. As she worked, Raina listed off the regulations she was violating, just to calm her nerves and distract from the number of ways she could die, like if she slipped and touched the wire, or if her blade handle and glove weren't strong enough insulators, or if she took too long and the rakghouls broke in…

The distraction wasn't working very well.

When she finished, though, she sat back with a smile and wiped her brow. Hey daddy, she thought, you're little girl's an electrician. Then she listened for the turrets firing.

Nothing. Oh, no. had she done it wrong? Maybe she'd shorted the circuits while working Though, if she wasn't dead, it still hadn't gone as badly as it could have.

No, wait. What was that sound? Raina turned to look at the med station. She couldn't figure out the sound over the rakghouls' howling.

The smell, however, was much more identifiable. Burning kolto.

It took a few seconds to disconnect the cables she'd spliced, but the makeshift electrician counted herself lucky. She hadn't set the room on fire, and now she had kolto. Sort of. It was worth the chance that the kolto was still good, so she picked up the tin of her med pack and opened the cabinet door. Kolto flooded out, and she only got a little of it, but it was something. A few sips for Vector, a little better chance for the Joiner to make it through this.

She owed Cipher Nine that much.

The door frame made a cracking sound.

"Er… status update?" Raina tried, moving to try the second wire as fast as she dared.

Her father responded, at least. "Med bay entrance is barricaded, but we don't know how long it'll hold. The turrets are a no-go. We don't have any equipment to safely cut the wires. We're looking for another way out, but unless Scorpio changes its mind and gives us a hand, I don't know what we'll do."

"Wait a second." It was hard to focus on that last sentence and working at the same time. "Scorpio, why aren't you helping my father?"

"Your progenitor has not proven himself worth the effort."

Emperor alone! "Scorpio, I'm getting my father out of here alive. If you don't help us, I'm that much more likely to die trying."

"Calculating… Highest probability of survival contingent on abandoning extraneous objectives."

Raina glared at the cable she was holding. "Now calculate the odds of me doing that. And factor in what Cipher Nine would do."

"Raina," said Darren Temple, "she has a point. If you can get out of here alive, you have to do that. If you can find a way to the facility entrance, it's possible the rakghouls haven't left the prison yet."

She almost shook her head out of habit. Dangerous, given what she was handling. The cables crackled quietly with power, barely audible between the slams on the door. "I don't think I can make it that far on my own. Even in the low gravity, Vector is too heavy for-"

"You're not taking Vector." Darren Temple actually sounded shocked. "He's unconscious. Dead weight. He'll get you both killed!"

"I'm not leaving him any more than I'm leaving you." The cables merged perfectly, and Raina heard the sound of mechanisms shifting just outside the doors. "Scorpio, get my father a way out of this facility safely. I'll be joining him soon."

She barely heard Scorpio's acknowledgment, and ignored her father's protests entirely.

It took a few seconds to check the stun batons for any that worked. Three of them did. She hooked one on her belt and managed to keep hold of the other one as she picked up Vector and slung him across her shoulders. At least the gravity was low. It made things so much easier.

Not that the rakghouls outside would care.

"Ensign Raina Temple, leave us and get out of here alive! That is an order!"

Raina looked at Vector's face, sharp-nosed and slicked with sweat, and she thought of another, a pale face with an intense, visored gaze.

"I don't take orders from you," Raina said. "Sir."

The turrets started firing, and Raina kicked the door open, catching the button and slamming the door outwards in the same motion.

There were more rakghouls than she'd thought. They filled the halls, batting at the blaster bolts they clearly found more annoying than threatening.

The turrets were on high-gravity settings. It was a good thing their fire rate was blinding. The strobe effect was probably doing as much to slow the rakghouls as the blaster bolts.

Raina stepped forward and electrocuted a rakghoul with her stun baton, then ran. Or tried to. It was a terrified, stumbling shamble, made awkward by the low gravity and by Vector ruining her center of mass, and worse by the need to stun every rakghoul in her path in the thin hallway. A rak roared in her face and got a stun baton in the eye for its trouble, but it was only one of many. She stumbled away from the swipes of two more, ones that only missed because they were half-blind and trying to escape the turret's line of fire. The smell of ionized air and the fungal, sweaty stench of the beasts filled her nose and head. The sound of blasterfire, of the rakghouls' roars and screeches, of crackling arcs of electricity from the stun baton, resonated in the narrow halls. It all turned a terrifying race for survival into a mind-bending gauntlet.

She shouldn't be here. A rakghoul lunged at her, and she almost fell into the turret's line of fire as she moved out of the way. If Kaliyo were here, she'd have bulldozed the beast with the weight of her armour. If Vector had been conscious, he could have fought off the beasts himself. Both would have moved with heedless determination. Raina barely held in a scream as another beast grabbed at her with clawed hands.

She did scream when those claws caught on her stun baton and tore it from her hand.

The scream got louder when another set of claws raked across her tricep and shoulder blade. Within a heartbeat, she felt sick. In another two, she was kneeling on the floor. Her brain was numb, her body ached, and she could feel her sense of self going ragged, like the claws had torn it to bloody shreds. One hand fumbled for her other stun baton, but she didn't have enough room to draw it.

She was going to die, and Vector was going to die. And Kaliyo and Darren and Lokin-

"STOP!"

The rakghouls, all of them, froze for an instant. Long enough. Raina drew the second baton and hit the three closest monsters with it. They went down and she clambered over them without really standing up. This time, she waved the weapon blindly, unable to even focus on aiming or picking her targets. She just did her very best to put one foot in front of the other and make sure she wasn't stumbling into any rakghouls.

At the edge of the group, just before she escaped, a rakghoul lunged for Vector. She tried to dodge, but there wasn't room. Her baton was in her other hand, trapped where it could do no good. She shifted her weight, thrust out her arm, and let the beast take her instead of her friend. It was stupid, it was against protocol and, even after everything, it brought tears to her eyes and a scream tearing through gritted teeth. But Vector was her responsibility.

She didn't look. She tried not to think. She just burst from the crowd and ran.

In seconds, she saw the next safe room. It was too far. Or too close. Or… something. If she tried to get in, the rakghouls would get her before she got through the door.

They had to make it to the med bay.

Raina ran, and cried, and would have screamed if she could have spared the breath. She hoped she was imagining the hot breath on her legs, prayed it was just a trick that she could hear howling in every direction, around every corner.

Emperor, let this be a nightmare.

How much further was it to the med bay? Was she going in the right direction? Everything hurt. Her arms and back were a piercing emptiness, her head a dull throb. Her legs burned and her back ached. Her jaw and fists were sore from clenching so tight.

Then she turned the corner and saw the med bay, and the drowning feeling in her heart turned to stabbing ice.

The med bay doors had been torn open, and rakghouls were streaming into it from up and down the hall. They were everywhere.

Everywhere.

They were all going to die.

She'd failed.


	4. Chapter 4

Raina stumbled slowly to a stop as a monster's roar filled her ears, her mind, her body. She fell to the ground and Vector tumbled from her shoulders into her arms. She clung tight to the unconscioius Joiner, and some inane part of her wondered if Cipher Nine would be angry with her. Or jealous.

She'd never even know how he'd died.

Seconds passed, and the roar finally ended.

Silence.

For the first time in what felt like a lifetime, the prison was completely quiet. The rakghouls didn't move, didn't snarl or growl. They just stood, waiting.

"Raina." A voice in her commlink. Her father's voice was steady, controlled. "Are you alright? Do you know what's going on?"

Raina didn't say anything. She was too afraid of breaking the spell.

The sound started again, and Raina shivered. But it was just one voice, growing quietly. A few rakghouls shifted, down the hallway. Then another of the monsters, more than twice as large as the others, pushed through the swarm.

"Raina, please tell me you're alright," whispered her comm.

The rakghoul was wearing a tattered white labcoat.

"It's the doctor," she whispered. She raised a hand to touch her commlink. "It's Doctor Lokin. He's here."

Doctor Lokin approached, and she couldn't help shrinking away. He paid it no mind, though. It was weird to see a rakghoul, especially such a large one, fumbling through its pockets, but in a moment there were three vials sitting in front of Raina. One was kolto, the other two she didn't recognize.

Then Doctor Lokin brought out a syringe gun and grouped it wit hthe kolto and one of the other vials. From another pocket, he brought… a spray bottle?

It wasn't time for questions. Raina wasn't sure she could have formed coherent ones even if it were. All she could do was take the vials and apply them one by one, first to herself, then to Vector. The aerosol smelled overwhelmingly bad, but the two injections cleared her mind and suppressed the acid the rakghoul wounds had spread through her identity.

Without waiting for her breathing to return to normal, Doctor Lokin – still in his monstrous rakghoul form – picked up Vector and led the way to the med bay. Raina struggled to her feet and followed.

The swarm was starting to make noise again, growling and snarling and snapping at each other, but not moving to attack. They moved out of the way of the larger rakghoul, and Raina stayed close enough to him that they let her pass, too.

There was a scream from inside, and Raina belatedly keyed her comm and said, "we're coming in."

A shout of, "it's alright! This one's okay!" came from ahead, but the other shouting and screaming didn't stop until Raina entered the room.

She fell to her knees again when she crossed the threshold. After everything, normal gravity felt like too much. It was all she could do to crawl further into the room.

"You should all be as quiet as you can," she managed, not even looking up. "The noise is agitating the ones outside."

Hands grabbed her and pulled her to her feet and further into the room. Her father's hands. The held her up long enough for her to get a look at the room.

It was a standard, pristine medical facility, except that it had been torn apart. Aside from a couple of occupied beds, the slight metal frames and their mattresses were piled beside the doors. The drawers and cupboards of medicine all hung open and mostly empty. Six people were in the room, only two of whom were standing. Two sat against the wall, and the last two lay on beds. Rakghouls littered the entryway, and Raina almost tripped over one as she was taken towards a mattress with no frame.

He tried to lay her down, but she sat. Barely. When her father stepped back to get a look at her, it gave her a chance to see him properly for the first time. He was covered in blood. It was all over him, especially his arms. Why didn't he look wounded?

"She's been bitten!"

Who was that? Raina turned and saw somebody else in a white coat. Not Doctor Lokin. This one was human, and a lot younger. Red-haired and scared. Raina tried to reassure him.

"Don't worry," she said, "it was only claws. I can't even feel them."

For some reason, that didn't comfort the man. That made Raina sad.

"She's been vaccinated," her father snapped. "Now get over here and help her. She's in shock!"

"No," Raina insisted, standing up, "Vector-"

She fell forward before she could say any more. Her father caught her, but it hurt her arms and back.

"By the stars," whispered a voice behind her. Then another pair of hands grabbed her and sat her back down. She tried to turn her head to see the other person, but her father held her head.

"Well, the bleeding's stopped. Officer-"

"Raina. Her name's Raina."

"Officer Raina. Did you have your own kolto?"

"No," Raina shook her head. "Doctor Lokin gave me some." She pointed at the old man, just in case anybody didn't know.

It took her a second to realize that might be a bad idea.

"Doctor- that beast has a name? Why would you call it doctor?!"

Well, there was no need to get hysterical. Raina frowned at the lack of professionalism. She tried to frown at the doctor, but her father still wouldn't let her turn around.

"Doctor Yngran," Darren Temple said, in a voice that was so calm it had to be a threat, "we have absolutely no room for details right now. That rakghoul will not attack you unless you do something that makes me, Raina, or Mr. Hyllus over there angry. Until then, it is your best chance of surviving this."

It got really quiet behind Raina.

Her back was starting to hurt, too.

Doctor Lokin strode over over to them, though, by rights, he should have lumbered, and pointed to Raina's side.

Her side…? Her belt! She took the spray bottle from it and proffered it to the rakghoul. He just shook his head and pointed to Darren Temple.

The old spy wrinkled his nose. "Is that the stuff that's making you smell like a military ration that's been marinating in stale sweat for a month?"

Raina blushed and nodded.

Darren Temple looked at Doctor Lokin. "Rakghoul pheromones?"

Doctor Lokin nodded as well.

It took a reluctant Darren Temple seconds to spray himself down, and then he handed it back to a frowning Raina. Something was wrong, even if she wasn't thinking quickly enough to be certain of it just yet.

Staring at the bottle, she realized what it was.

The bottle was three-quarters empty. There was only enough for one more person. There were still five people in the med bay who hadn't been treated, and…

"Kaliyo!" Raina keyed her commlink again, hoping for some response this time. "Kaliyo, are you there?"

Dead silence.

Poor choice of words.

Raina held up the spray bottle to the rakghoul doctor. "Can we protect the patients without this?"

In spite of his appearance, Doctor Lokin managed to mirror Darren Temple's incredulous look. "We can't bring them with us," Darren hissed. "They'll panic, the ones who can even move. We won't make it with them in tow."

Doctor Lokin nodded in agreement. The first time the two old spies had agreed on anything.

It was just like he'd said earlier, but suddenly Raina realized that her father had never had any intention of saving anyone. The moment the rakghouls appeared, he'd chosen to abandon the mission and save only one person: his daughter.

Raina's hand shot out before she even realized what she was doing, so fast that her ears registered the resounding smack before she properly felt the pain of her wounds.

She glared at her stupefied father and stared down the equally dumbstruck Lokin. "Cipher Nine warned me this could happen," she hissed, "that your experience might get in the way of your morals. Under his orders, I'm taking command of this mission. We're saving everyone, no matter what."

"Raina," Darren said, "Cipher Nine is dead."

"Then that was his last order," she snapped. "Now both of you start figuring something out." Then she walked past them to the others in the med bay, but not without a parting, "and don't let any other rakghouls in here!"

When she reached Doctor Yngan, who was trembling on the other side of the room from Lokin, she looked around at his patients and gave him a meaningful look.

Yngan nodded. "Yes, this is everyone. After the evacuations, we finally had room to breath. It was just the check-ups I could handle and those two I didn't want moved when..." He trailed off meaningfully.

Raina latched on to the important information there. "They can't be moved?"

Doctor Yngan gestured at small tubes in the patients' nostrils and IVs leading to their hands. "I didn't want to risk it." Then something seemed to click and his eyes focused properly on her. "You should be lying down. Kolto only does so much for shock, and those wounds are a full kolto immersion away from being manageable."

Raina shook her head, though mention of her injuries made them throb and burn. "Check on my partner. He's unconscious, took a bolt from a malfunctioning blaster."

The man lookedher up and down before slumping slightly. "At least sit down," he said, and moved to check on Vector.

Leaving Raina to find some way of getting everyone out of the facility without moving two of the patients. Except that wasn't possible. Any way they used to get out would require running and fighting. Doctor Lokin couldn't ferry people out, because that would leave the people in the med bay unprotected. They couldn't spray the two immobile people, because they didn't have enough pheromone left. There wasn't a secret exit or anything. Scorpio would have provided the information, then.

Raina sat down a little too heavily on the floor. She'd gotten used to the low gravity outside, and the normal gravity in the med bay was…

Was…

The grav generator! If they couldn't escape the rakghouls, they'd have to get rid of them. In the med bay and safe rooms, everyone was sheltered from the main generator's gravity. Elsewhere, though… if Raina could get down to the generator and override the safeties, they might have a way of clearing out the rakghouls without risking anyone. Raina would have to go alone, leaving Doctor Lokin to guard the room and her father to keep everyone from panicking, but it could work!

It had to work. And if they could find Kaliyo, if Kaliyo was still alive to find, maybe this mission wouldn't have been a complete waste of life.

That part, even she couldn't convince herself of.

"Doctor," she called. When both man and rakghoul turned to face her, she clarified, "Doctor Yngan. Does the med bay have grav suits?"

The main generator was at the bottom of the facility. The only elevator was near the entrance. The whole trip would take time, far too much time for them to make it back, maybe too much to even get to a safe room afterward. Grav suits would be the only sure way to survive the enhanced gravity.

Doctor Yngan nodded and pointed to a closet in the back corner of the room. "But they aren't armoured, they can't – no, no please don't stand up, ma'am! You're seriously injured!"

Raina ignored him and walked over to the closet. Inside were two grav suits that looked to be in perfect shape. She took out the first one and, over the protests of the doctor, started putting it on.

"Raina," said another voice, hard enough to cut through Doctor Yngan's protests. Darren Temple, now standing beside Raina, stared at her coldly. "What are you planning?"

"I'm going to repair the grav gener- ah!" Raina hissed as her movements pulled at her wounds. She could feel the wetness that meant it had started bleeding again. Not enough kolto and not enough time for proper healing. "Enough gravity should kill the rakghouls."

"And if that suit is damaged or doesn't have enough charge, you die, too. That's assuming your blood doesn't send them into a frenzy."

Them. Raina was trying desperately not to think about going out there again. It was the generator she needed to think about. The plan. Not… anything else.

Both father and daughter looked at the med bay entrance, where Doctor Lokin was growling at approaching rakghouls, keeping the few people left in the facility safe.

"We have to save who we can," Raina said, "and we have to stop the rakghouls before they escape."

"We have to save ourselves," her father corrected. "Lokin can get us out of here, then we hit this place from orbit. Then we figure out what to do with him."

For causing this, he meant. Raina sort of agreed with that last part. Saving them didn't absolve the doctor of having gotten hundreds of people killed.

Including Kaliyo. Which meant Cipher Nine had died, alone and halfway across the galaxy, for nothing.

"We've done enough harm," Raina said, and tried not to grit her teeth as the suit slid over her arms.

"Wait."

Raina stopped. Turned. It hadn't been her father who'd spoken.

"We will accompany you."

Vector was sitting up on his cot, awake and alert. Alive.

Doctor Yngan beat Raina to him by a few steps, but recoiled when he saw the Joiner's black eyes. That gave Raina the opportunity to kneel down beside her friend.

"Are you alright, Vector?"

He didn't nod or react, except to stand and walk towards the suit closet. His normal grace was missing in those first few steps; they were uneven, and he almost tripped, but the awkwardness was gone by the time he reached the other side of the room.

"Hyllus." Darren Temple caught up with Vector as he pulled out the other suit. "Don't encourage her. You're going to get both of yourselves killed. If you're going to leave, just take her and get to the ship."

Vector only put on his grav suit. It took him half the time it had taken Raina, and his leg wound didn't seem to bother him. He was standing beside Raina again in a minute.

"We are ready."

Both Darren Temple and Doctor Yngan tried to protest, but Raina just watched Vector. Something was off.

It occurred to her that the last thing Vector had heard before being shot was that his best friend was dead.

"Vector," she asked again, "are you okay?"

"We seem to have recovered from the guard's attack."

Which neatly dodged the real question.

"Vector," she tried again, "Cipher Nine-"

He started walking away, towards the med bay entrance, and passed Doctor Lokin before Raina cut off and hurried after him. It hurt her back whenever she hurried. Vector usually noticed things like that and took care of everyone.

The air changed as they entered the hall. Raina could smell and feel the rakghouls surrounding the door as much as she could see them. They were everywhere, jostling for position around the door, peering in and looking at the morsels within. Only Doctor Lokin kept them from approaching.

As if thinking the same thing, Vector turned, barely a meter from the nearest rakghoul, and called back, "Eckard."

Doctor Lokin strode to the entrance, in spite of the fact that something his size should, by all rights, lumber. The smaller monsters pulled back slightly as he approached, keeping a full few meters back.

When the doctor came up beside them, he placed clawed hands on their shoulders. It was light enough that it didn't hurt, but the claws felt sharp and dangerous through Raina's jacket.

Then Doctor Lokin roared, loud and long, and every one of the creatures scattered.

Vector led the way before the sound even stopped echoing.

The beasts didn't run far, and they didn't scatter well. Vector actually put a hand on one to push it aside as they entered the swarm. Raina wiped away tears and followed, stun baton gripped tight.

An Imperial did her duty. No matter what. Rakghouls leaned close and she breathed in their breath. Vector wouldn't talk, so she was forced to listen to the rakghouls' gurgling, purring sounds. She touched more than one, pushing past in the narrow hallways.

Eventually, Vector asked, "Kaliyo?"

Raina couldn't speak. She was passing within kissing distance of a rakghoul with what looked like strands of hair in its teeth. It was all she could do not to throw up, but she shook her head and hoped that would be enough.

It was almost reassuring how calm the creatures were when they didn't think there was meat nearby. Still, Raina waited until they'd gotten some space before saying, "we lost contact while you were unconscious. I... think she would have contacted us, if she could."

Before then, Raina would have thought Vector couldn't make facial expressions, except perhaps when his eyes were a more normal colour. Now, she realized how wrong she'd been. Vector's normally impassive face contorted in a mixture of disgust, anger, and despair. For the first time, he really seemed to focus on the rakghouls, but it wasn't with the same fear as Raina felt. Vector watched them with a look of pure hatred.

His voice, when he spoke, was still disturbingly emotionless. "The good doctor will answer for this." Then he set his shoulders and continued on towards the facility entrance, where the elevator waited.

Looking at the rakghouls, so close and so many, Raina wasn't sure what she would do if he decided not to take the elevator. If he went on to the ship, would she be brave enough to keep going without him?

Or would she be like her father?

The rakghouls shifted as one, turning to face the direction of the entrance. As one, they moved, and Raina almost screamed, almost swung her stun baton at them.

But they weren't attacking. They ignored Raina and Vector entirely, surging past like a grey river. Raina pressed herself against the wall while Vector stood amidst the stampede, and for almost a minute they watched the creatures pass them by.

Then, as the war cries faded down the halls, Vector spoke.

"Kaliyo."

A part of Raina wanted to believe it, if only to explain what had turned a simple walk through enemy territory into… whatever had just happened. Her heart was pounding so hard it made the gashes on her arms and back ache. Still, she couldn't let herself believe yet. "Vector," she whispered, "Kaliyo is-"

"No," Vector interrupted her. Again. He took a step across the hall and took her hand. "Kaliyo."

Then she felt it. That tangible sense of connection, that unique combination of rebellion, spite, and egotism that meant Kaliyo was somewhere close.

Instinctively, Raina reached out for the fourth of them, trying in vain to feel Cipher Nine out there somewhere. There was nothing. Of course. Even if he'd still been alive, he'd be too far away for the two of them to sense.

When Vector let go, all Raina could do was nod. Kaliyo was there, at the front of the rakghoul horde, and they had to save her.

They ran. It hurt. The grav suit, inactive, rubbed against her wounds even in the low gravity. She wasn't sure what they would do when they reached Kaliyo. Without guns or backup or the pheromones Doctor Lokin used, there wasn't a way to save the cutthroat.

"Do you hear?"

Raina almost asked, "hear what?" Then she realized.

Blasterfire.

She tried to run faster. Vector, in his graceful way, stayed just a step ahead of her. He guided her, in a way, showing her exactly where to step to move as fast as possible, even with the low gravity and dead weight of the suit and gashes in her arms and, worst of all, the knowledge of what they were running towards.

Under her gloves, her knuckles were white on her stun baton.

The blasterfire got louder, and the roaring and screeching of rakghouls came back into earshot. Except, something was off. There was a lot more blasterfire than Kaliyo could account for. Had she teamed up with some of the guards?

Raina could hear Kaliyo's response to that idea, and apparently the ensign's imagination had finally picked up enough profanity to properly emulate the rattataki. Her face reddened slightly, as much as it could, with how much blood she'd lost today.

"Stop." Vector spoke so softly and stopped so suddenly that he had to grab her and pull her back as she passed him. Raina let out a startled and pained scream as her arm twisted and her wound ground against the grav suit's metal. It might have been worth it, though. A flurry of blaster bolts flew down the hallway she'd been about to cross. Harmless, since Vector had made sure she wasn't in their way.

She turned to t hank him, but he was already speaking.

"We are sorry, Raina. Are you alright?"

That sounded more like the Vector she knew. Through the pain and the fear, she found herself smiling. "I'm alright, Vector."

It was a lie. Her arm was wet again, blood pouring out of the re-opened wound. Still, she was alive, and Vector hadn't meant to hurt her.

She peeked around the corner, then drew her head back quickly. There were a lot more blaster bolts where the first ones had come from.

"I think every rakghoul in earshot is already hear," she reported. "And whoever is with Kaliyo, they brought guns that can do the job."

It still wasn't the most efficient way of saving the prison. Who knew how many people were going to be killed in the direct conflict?

"Vector, what do we do?"

"We wait." The man leaned back against the wall, watcing the red streaks blur throug the air less than a meter away.

"But we should help!"

"They will be successful, with or without one stun baton," Vector said. Then he looked down the hallway they'd come from. "It seems you were incorrect."

Raina turned to follow his gaze. Her heart sank.

There were more rakghouls. All she could do was press herself against the wall until they passed.

Except they didn't. They slowed as they approached. They looked directly at her and Vector. Five of them spread out to surround the two humans.

But they couldn't be after her again. Doctor Lokin had made her spray herself. Vector, too.

She whimpered, but held out her stun baton and stepped forward. Her heart hurt, her back hurt, her head hurt.

Vector put his hand on hers.

"Ensign," he said softly, "you are very brave, but you should give us the baton."

He took it from her so smoothly that she didn't even resist.

The rakghouls crept closer. The blasterfire, mere meters away, didn't faze them. It lit them up, half of them glistening red, half shadowy grey. Every one hungry and horrid.

Without another option, Raina unholstered her blaster.

"Please stand back," Vector asked. One of the rakghouls made a questing swipe, and Vector countered the move smoothly, scorching the beast's hand. It growled and leaped back. "We need to move freely."

That was a good idea, but the halls were too narrow for her to take more than a step back, now.

An idea occurred to Raina. She glanced up at the high ceiling. There was another option.

She turned on her grav suit, activated zero-gravity, and gave a small hop.

It was disorienting, floating towards the roof, but it gave Vector enough room to drop into a proper fighting stance, and it gave Raina an excellent vantage point.

It was… very disorienting. She tried to aim her blaster at one of the rakghouls as it leaped at her friend, but there were black spots in her eyes. She fired, but the shot only hit the ground. Her fingers wouldn't squeeze the trigger again.

Vector dodged so quickly. He was hard to keep track of. They all moved so quickly.

Then she hit the ceiling, and the metal suit dug into her back. It hurt, but Raina didn't make a sound. She didn't do anything.

Everything was too dark…

"Hey! Hey, floaty! Get down here!"

Raina started awake, feeling worse than when she'd – she'd fallen asleep!

A second's flailing and yelling ended abruptly when her shoulder wound brought her back to her senses. She was in the air, floating in a grav suit, and Kaliyo was yelling at her.

Gentle hands pulled her to the ground and reactivated her gravity. Her feet hit the floor with a slight wobble, but then she was safe.

Raina looked around at a crowd of faces. "H-how long was I…?"

"Just under four minutes," Vector said. "You missed little."

Five rakghoul corpses on the ground said otherwise.

"Yeah, whatever," grunted Kaliyo, rapping knuckles on Raina's helmet. "Gimme your hand. Vector says we're doing touchy-feely crap to check something." Then she reached down and wrenched Raina's hand up. When Raina gasped, Kalyo rolled her eyes and bobbed her head at one of the helmeted figures. "Give her some bloody kolto, I'm not babying her through this."

Somebody stuck a med-gun into Raina's shoulder and there was a hiss as kolto pumped straight into her system.

"Bug-boy-" Vector took Kaliyo's other hand.

The feeling of them flooded through Raina. Kaliyo's anger and indignant protectiveness, Vector's calm and drive, and… there was…

"Cipher Nine!" Raina's eyes burst open. He was alive!

"We already informed you of this," one of the newcomers said, a little petulantly.

Kaliyo waved a dismissive hand.

Raina didn't know what filled her with more relief: finding Kaliyo, sensing Cipher Nine alive, seeing reinforcements, the kolto now running through her system.

"And," Raina asked, looking at the man who'd spoken, "who are you?"

"They're ex-Intelligence. Boss sent them here to help," Kaliyo said. She grinned, knowing she'd interrupted what the man had been about to say. "I found them on the way to the ship, figured they could make themselves useful."

"There are too many of them," Raina said, looking around at the twenty or more soldiers.

"Nah. I figure we got most of the raks on the way in. Right, bug-boy?"

Raina shook her head. "No, I mean, the way to get all the rakghouls. For sure. We have to overload the gravity generator in the base of the prison. We don't have enough grav suits for everyone, though."

One of the people in black stepped forward, a man not much larger than Raina. "Sounds like a good plan. We can raid the safe rooms and activate the generator as clean-up procedure. You, however, need to leave."

"Leave?" Raina couldn't help but feel indignant. "I can help."

"Yeah, no," Kaliyo said. She pulled off the helmet of Raina's suit. "Get this thing off. We're leaving these glory hounds to it and you're getting back to the ship."

"I don't-" Raina cut off as Kaliyo pulled off her sleeve. Not because it hurt, which it did, but because a stream of blood poured out for about five seconds. Raina watched it all pour out, splashing onto the floor in slow motion. Then she looked up and caught Kaliyo's eyes.

"I'll go wait in the ship."

"With the med shit."

"With the med sh- medical supplies."

They got the rest of the suit off together, and Kaliyo led Raina back towards the prison entrance, yelling and gesticulating the whole way. That was alright. It calmed her. It sort of calmed Raina, too.

When they'd first arrived, it had been a short walk from the ship to the facility. Going back, it felt quite a bit longer. Kaliyo didn't help, but then, she wouldn't unless Raina collapsed again.

It took the ensign until the ship's entry ramp before she realized Vector wasn't with them.

"Kaliyo," she said softly, "would you go keep Vector safe?"

"No," said the rattataki flatly, pulling her into the ship. "Now hurry up. Boss is gonna kick my ass when he hears the shape you're in. Do me a favour and don't tell him anything if we can patch you up before he's back."

The gravity change made her light-headed again, but Kaliyo got her to the med bay and hooked her up to the kolto machine. "Immersion when I get back," Kaliyo said, and turned to walk away.

"Where are you going?"

Kaliyo looked back at Raina like she was stupid. "I'm going to make sure the rest of those idiots don't get killed. Now sit still and shut up."

Then she was out the door.

Five seconds later, she walked back the other way.

"I need a new commlink," she snapped. "Shut up."

Raina smiled. It took another minute for her friend to find the comm and get out of the ship, but she wasn't worried. Vector and Kaliyo had come through for her today. So had Scorpio, and even Cipher Nine, in a way.

Raina lay back on the medical bed, sinking into the sheets as best she could with the gashes that pressed against them.

Everything was going to be alright.

 **_**

 **Author's Note**

 **This is the end of "The Rescue Mission", the companion piece to, "From Patriot to Iconoclast". That's not to say there won't be more companion pieces, but this should be the last you see of Cipher Nine and the crew of the Sanguine End for a while. I can only hope that I did justice to these characters and wrote them even half as well as I like to imagine. Any advice, complaints, or requests would be welcome, because I write all of this in the hopes of one day being a decent writer, and I'll never manage it without plenty of help.**


End file.
